LavenderCoffee

These honeys can go all day! Seriously, the weartime does not disappoint. I was surprised at how much I love Womb Furie, given that SO doesn't do much for me, and honey can be fickle on my skin. Of course I do have a bottle from 2016, so it's possible the aged version is treating me better than a fresh bottle would. Maybe I will snag a 2022 for comparison. This is not an everyday scent for me, but sometimes I want a sexy honey bomb, and WF has me covered.

I must have got the bottle intended for Lucchesa, because I am getting the lovely tart rosehip note. The leather reminds me of the soft brown book cover note from the Skull/Music book/Snuffed Candle Vanitas, but it has a much better pairing here with the rosehips, in my opinion. Never got anything distinctly mushroom-y from it, but there is a pleasantly earthy touch to the scent. I love how wearable this blend is. It has an effortless elegance, and it also has a ton of staying power on fabric.

Freshly applied, the saccharine sweetness is no joke! Within the first five minutes the sweetness calms down to something more tolerable, and you can pick out the lavender water and her sinister sister opium. The best part of this scent is the drydown, where the two notes meld and it becomes a gorgeous perfume that lingers all day. Agree with rivetted that it is greater than the sum of its parts, and an unexpected pleasure.

This scent has a few distinct phases on my skin: Freshly applied, the beautiful bright red cherry note dominates. As it dries down, cherry disappears and the pink peppercorn and carnation take their turn, although the carnation is more prominent for me. Hours later, the honey comes to the foreground, with a hint of the pink pepper/carnation combo backing it up. I like the end phase the best, but I wish there was more interplay between the notes throughout. Just got this scent last week though, so there is potential for it to change with age. Six months on: the cherry is still knocking the door down, and it's a vivid cherry candy/cherry cough drop type of scent, but that only lasts about five minutes. Then the carnation opens up, and then a subtle cherry honey. I thought to retest this because I love the carnation in the Black Goat/Pink Flower painting from the May-June release, and it's nice, but still not quite my cup of tea.

This is beautifully sharp and provocative when initially applied. A very multifaceted scent for the first 30 minutes. Then as it dries down the vanilla and rose cream step forward, to comfort you as you wake up from a bad dream. It's a subtle rose, and the pink pepper and other florals float around the periphery. I never get the clove from this, and I wish I could hang out in the first phase of the scent longer.

I love how dramatic Event Horizon is when first applied, it really is a lot to process. Black orchid leads the charge with opium riding shotgun. Then after it dries down, the labdanum and benzoin draw a soft sweet black velvet curtain over everything.

I was pleasantly surprised by this one, and would not have picked it out for myself - it smells like four and twenty Peacock Queens, baked in a pie. Which is to say, the blackcurrant is barely there to my nose, and the rose is the deep dark infinite red rose of the Peacock Queen, and there is a delicious sugary pastry crust! I would eat this, if it was a real pie, and not a perfume. This is what I wanted from the Sugar Cookie Peacock Queen from Yule 2021, but the sugar cookie note did not agree with me.

Took a gamble on this one because saffron is not my friend. Luckily I didn't get any problems from it here, but this is another one that is a bit too subtle for me after it dries. I end up with white clove over amber over subtle woody patch, which is nice if I stick my nose in it, but I wish it was bigger.

Tested a 2019 decant. I really wanted to love this because SO and most SO blends do not work for me, and cacao is my jam. I almost thought I had one here, but it disappears on my skin. No boom in my Boomslang. ETA: ohhhhh I see I see. I got my hands on a 2008 bottle, it went on like hershey's syrup and smells like a dream. Cocoa Snake Oil. New edit! It's 2024 and I got a new label bottle secondhand and it's dreamy. Not sure if it's pre or post 2022 SO, but I like it better than 2008 🍫. I think now that I am no longer expecting this to be especially foodie or even gourmand, I am happier with it. It's sweet, and there's a cocoa note, but it's not really choccy. I am getting a lot more of the teakwood in this now and I enjoy that too. Anyway I have been on a boomslang journey, and I like where I ended up!

Just got this as a bonus in a lab order. The label is a lovely swirl of maple leaves on a breeze over a patch of grass. In the bottle it is punishingly sharp and bitter, and I was prepared to dislike it because the Dead Leaves ™️scent note usually disagrees with my skin, but I wanted to give it a quick test anyway, just to be sure ...and it is actually kinda nice. It begins mostly grassy, and as it dries, it actually smells like leaves in the yard in Autumn. Agree that this could be a lovely layering option, there's a pleasing balance and softness to it that I haven't gotten from more recent dead leaves blends. A leaf I can live with!

Testing a decant. I've been on a bit of an oudventure lately, and was excited to get a chance to test drive this one. Freshly applied, it was a bit woody and scratchy, but it settles into bold, peppery oud. I love how dark and rich this is, and would definitely consider a bottle. Wear this if you need to do a revenge.

Just snagged this off the old Etsy shop in Jan 2022. I don't love all red musk blends, but I love this red musk blend, and I love all the notes. The oudh, patch and fossilized amber are awesome in this. It's somehow slinky and skanky at the same time, and smoother than I expected. Could do with a bit more cacao. Makes me want to put on a lip.

I love how White Rabbit smells when freshly applied, but my skin seems to eat it up rather quickly. After 30 minutes I'm left with a very faint impression of an orchid adjacent floral and a trace of sweetness. Maybe I will try it as a locket scent.

2021 version In the bottle and on initial application, this is a very sharp herbal lavender scent. But then, as puellacaerulea mentions, someone turns the volume down on the lavender and up on the amber. I think I was hoping for a bit more ambergris from this blend, but it is very soft and comforting. Once it dries completely, I do get a vanillic quality, with just a hint of lavender remaining. Seems to last a reasonable amount of time, but stays close to the skin for me.

I had a somewhat similar experience as groovyrooby with this one. I don't usually care for apple notes in perfume, and I was not expecting to like this as much as I do! Right off the bat, I get a deliciously realistic caramel apple scent that is really lovely. There's definitely funnel cake/powdered sugar hanging out with red musk, and just a hint of narcissus in the murky patch background, bc my skin will always find narcissus, lol. It shouldn't be this good, but of course it is!

I am confused by Drow Yoga Instructor. It is barely there when applied, and then fades out even more as it dries. Very faint incense, trace of lavender, then poof! Gonezo. Well, not entirely gone. There is a hint of something flat and funky, which is what my skin does with saffron, so you all may be on to something with that - or maybe I am finding that based on the suggestion! Either way, this is not a good match for my skin chemistry, but happy to test it out.

I totally slept on this one when it was initially released (🥁) but have since enjoyed a different blend with opium, so I wanted to check this out. I don't understand which notes are contributing to the aquatic effect here beyond the sea salt, but I was not prepared for this lovely plum ocean! It is a murky, sweet, saltwater plum when first applied, and after a few hours of wear, it becomes a muted plum on the sweet seabed of opium, labdanum and benzoin, with a trace of salt on my skin. Very pleasantly surprised by this.

Leaf Moon leads with the dead leaves scent plus woodsmoke, and the woodsmoke takes over for the first hour or so of wear. After that, I get an almost perfume-like effect from the patchouli and leaves, with a touch of smoke lingering, and I have to get in close to find any trace of sweetness from the musk. I'm intrigued because dead leaves blends do not usually work for me, and I like this dark, autumnal patchouli more than I expected.

This is not normally my kind of scent - pink roses are actually on my nope list - but thanks to all the delightful reviews, I thought it couldn't hurt to track down a decant and check it out. Of course I kinda love it, and I blame the bergamot. It's warm and not overbearingly sweet, and ends up smelling like a rose resting its head on a lady grey marshmallow pillow.

I worried about black musk stomping over everything here, but I need not have, since my skin loves champaca and the musk is forced to play second fiddle. The overall effect of this blend for me is a soft violet champaca musk over patch and dark dramatic roses. Torn about upgrading it and running out of time to decide! ETA: Oh hey look it's 2 years later and I did indeed get a bottle. This is ridiculously gorgeous - there's a huge rush of sweet lavender tinged purple floral in the wet phase that I don't remember getting when I first acquired this, and it just keeps getting better as it wears. Black musk and champaca should never have worked for me, but that delicious base of patchouli and resins is perfection and everything just clicks. It's also very big scent and I always put too much on, but oh well 😅

I seem to dig the perfumey Liliths this year, of which this is definitely one. In my head, I thought this would be darker, but on my skin it dries into a lavender-backed orchid scent over plush musk and oud. Without looking at the notes, I would probably have just called this an orchid perfume. No idea where leather and tobacco are hiding, but I think I'm gonna upgrade this one and see how it grows up.

Not much new to contribute here, but it really is like a cloud - very soft and floofy. I thought the bourbon vanilla would be a bit more imposing, and although the cardamom is initially quite pronounced for me, it becomes a light, dreamy scent.

This leads with amber for me - a subtly sweet amber with a similarly subtle honey. Some honey blends are quite loud and cloying on my skin and this one is neither. I can't suss out anything like beeswax or vanilla in this blend, but the honey blends so seamlessly with the amber that I can see where both of those notes would fit into the soft warm glow. As it dries, the "fire" note emerges, and I also find this part hard to describe. As mentioned above, it's more like a flame than a whole fire: not smoky or spicy - it just smells warm. Horses remains close to the skin, but creates a perfect memory of honey, amber, and fire.

My skin loves narcissus and always catapults that note to the front. I struggle with jasmine sometimes, but the combination of the two works well for me here, and both are prominent when freshly applied. As the oil dries, the lemon peeks out, and more of the plum, lavender and labdanum are evident, since the narcissus/jasmine combo actually calms down and shares the stage! This blend is a win for me: a dark moody floral with moderate throw.

This duet is absolutely gorgeous. I love a cacao note, but it doesn't always last on my skin. Here, the oud seems to help it stick. Each note plays off the other for a lovely and sophisticated chocolate perfume. Not much throw, but decent staying power.